Month: July 2018

Three months ago I spent a week in the mountains. The weather, as documented in blogs at the time, was bad on the first day, getting gradually better as the week progressed. The experience I am about to relay relates to the final walk of the week. The original blog can be read here:

If you haven’t followed the link and read it, in a nutshell, the weather was perfect, warm and bright and was a great day.

Now. I am fairly open minded. This applies to anything really, existence of God, life in space, ghosts, and whether Elton John wears a wig. Whilst I am open minded, experiencing things that I can’t explain disturb me just a little. When I was younger I saw a shape move across the top of the stairs. There were also times when loud bangs would be heard upstairs while we’re all in the living room. There were probably other examples during my life when odd things have happened. The latest thing is what happened to me on this mountain.

It was on the last leg. I’d climbed out of the valley onto the highest point of the walk. On the saddle of the ridge, it was very windy. So I took advantage of a drystone wall to shelter behind to check the map. Bearings found, off I set on a gently sloping path, a terrace, clinging to the eastern slopes of the mountain. Luckily, it was out of the wind, baked by the sun, and covered in heather and other vegetation. The first half of the slow descent was fairly lonely, just a couple of girls coming down from the summit, crossing my path on their way straight down to the valley floor. A five minute chat and we were all on our way again. I have to say, mountain chats are by far the best ones. I just know I’m going to have some utterly positive and uplifting conversations with complete strangers. I guess it’s because it’s so easy. It’s clear that the fact you’re all up there on a weekday shows you all have a mutual love of the outdoors and uplands.

After my new friends had left me, I stopped occasionally and turned to watch them disappearing down the hillside until after twenty minutes or so, I could no longer make them out. I continued my slow descent until a strange uneasy feeling came over me. I can only describe it as just feeling a little nervous, on edge (pun intended), and hurried. This feeling was then followed by what I first thought was the wind whistling through a buckle or toggle on my bag, but there was no wind. It then became apparent that it was a humming sound. A tuneful female humming sound. I checked about me and was definitely alone. It was like the sound of a mother soothing a child to sleep.

It was strangely soothing to hear after the initial uneasiness. It probably only lasted for twenty or thirty seconds in the first instance. A couple of minutes later I heard it again. The next hour was spent in a very technical descent which required concentration, yet I found myself listening carefully for the lady’s voice again. It never came and I reached the car, heading out of the valley, occasionally looking at the path and mountain in the rear view mirror.

I’d like to think it’s because something terrible has gone wrong and their first thought is that it can only have occurred because I wasn’t there. As I haven’t been on holiday relatively recently, if anything has gone boob up, chances are it happened because I was there.

No, of course, they are referring to my natural tan. Being fair in complexion, I am prone to sunburn. When I used to burn, I burned, then peeled, then went back to pale again. But over the last eight or nine years since I seriously ramped up the running, hiking, cycling and alotmenteering, I have began to look decidedly grubby. I am proud of my cyclist’s tan, runner’s tan and general tan. Spending more and more time outdoors has made me look a bit more healthy. It’s not just on the outside however. Being an outdoorsy type is good for your mind. It’s no secret anymore that sunlight equals vitamin D which is good for your happiness levels amongst other things.

I like having an outdoor mind set too. If you’re the same as me, you will know where I am coming from. That kind of train of thought throughout the day that thinks in terms of contour lines, places to go, the fresh air in general. Conversation in the communal kitchen with me can soon turn to stories of weekend adventures, not what has been happening on the already-slated-by-me Love Island.

I find l loving the outdoors guides my decisions and even my wardrobe. I work in an office. Not a very creative environment, although it is meant to be and is viciously sold to our clients as one, and every bloke there wears pretty much the following: smart shoes, jeans, checked shirt. Attack of the clones. I, and one more guy, who incidentally is NOT an outdoorsy type (unless you count beer gardens and barbeques) wear shorts, and, wait for it…flip flops. Yes, in our minds, we are outdoors on the beach. We get stick for it, but I’d rather break rank and have an identity than cower in the safety of dressing like a lumberjack.

Keeping fit used to be my other thing. The thing I did when I wasn’t at work, and the thing I talked about and thought about when I was at work. Then a change happened. The more I kept fit outdoors, the more time I spent outdoors. Soon enough, the outdoors became my thing. It’s like a disease with next to no cure at all. But what a disease to have! Imagine if it was an epidemic, what do you think the world and its people would be like? Would we still be money and status driven? I think it would be a world where nature and environmental issues would take precedent, with the majority protecting their favourite spaces, and their decisions being driven by their love of the outdoors. It sounds a bit hippy-like, but can you picture a whole people wearing flip flops in high powered jobs? I can!

I think I’m getting old. The tell-tale signs are there. I won’t go into detail on all of them, but I think it’s healthy to admit it. One of the reasons I have for thinking this is that I seem to be fighting a lot nowadays. I don’t mean going down the pub and smashing a bottle over somebody’s head. Those days are well behind me. Luckily, last time, the victim didn’t press charges anyway, so I was quite fortunate. She was my mother-in-law after all. Anyway, I digress. By fighting, I mean standing up for things. People with flash LinkedIn profiles probably call this passionate, if at all they know what passionate means. I’ve discussed my job before here, and I think the main reason I hate it and seemingly suffer there is because I try to do my job right, and thoroughly, and I seem to be the only one. Everyone else has a wonderful day scraping by on the bare minimum required so they don’t get sacked. Whilst this mentality causes me to suffer at work, it does give me the strength and determination in other areas of my life to fight for something I feel is right, and is more likely to be a worthwhile cause, unlike my job which is feeding fat cats so they can get even fatter and do ridiculously unethical things with their money.

The point I’m getting to is as I’m aging, I’m realising that you suffer the most for things you fight for the most. Love Island would bore the living crap out of me, so I don’t watch it, but this same piece of asinine “entertainment” (can you tell I don’t like it?) could be the cornerstone of somebody else’s life. They could be involved in brawls over it. It bothers them, so they suffer for it. Football supporters are the same. Manchester United fans don’t give a rodent’s rear end about how Bristol City are getting on and vice versa but they will fight tooth and nail with City and Rovers fans all the same.

What is important to me are things like the environment, conservation, my own health and wellbeing and the health and wellbeing of my family and closest friends. I will stand up and fight for those when needed. I hate to forget my principles. I don’t feel they’re shallow and they are for the greater good.

I also believe that every little step in the right direction, no matter how small, is worth it. I’ve talked before about litterpicking and plastic pollution. Very small efforts everyday to fight these is still better than giving up. I sign petitions even though the odds are stacked ridiculously against the petitioners winning. I guess it’s called integrity.

Fighting is good, as long as it’s for the greater good. That definition is still too ambiguous to me however but it’s the closest I can get to a definitive one. Most of the problems we have in the world today are conceived from people fighting for the greater good until they work out their visions of the greater good are different. Then they fight each other.

My 18 year old self would look at me now and call me a miserable old git. I look at my 18 year old self and ask him why he didn’t fight enough for real things. That’s maturing though. I probably fall into the grumpy category. I struggle to recognise much today that I deem real enough to form an opinion on. The environment and self development are two big factors for me, and they go hand in hand. The environment and the state we leave it in will be our legacy in centuries time. It is a selfish act to harm our planet knowingly, saying “It’s not my problem because I won’t be around in a hundred years”.

If you’ve read this far, I think it’s worth mentioning that despite all of this, I do actually enjoy Christmas.

One life – live it. Four simple words. Clichéd perhaps? Over-used perhaps?

The first time I saw this as a slogan was as a sticker on a Land Rover. Since then, I’ve seen it hundreds of times as stickers on Land Rovers. Does this mean that in order to live this one life to the full, you need to be behind the wheel of a Land Rover? I think not. I get that Land Rover drivers might go off-roading, therefore getting their kicks, however, most of the ones I’ve seen carrying these stickers are in immaculate showroom condition. The nearest they’ve been to off-road was when they had two wheels on the pavement outside the post office for five minutes.

I imagine it could be a status symbol, or a way of generating envy. I get it when I’m crawling home after work in very slow traffic, and in the ever-so-slightly quicker moving lane there is a camper van with a surfboard strapped to the roof. It’s a symbol to me that says, wow, they’re living their life. In reality, they might not be able to surf, or even, underneath the cover, it could be an ironing board. One life – iron.

Perception vs reality can be a venomous trap. Judging people’s lives and means. What they choose to show you is only the tip of the iceberg. Smoke and mirrors. That’s a big mistake. An even bigger mistake is to take that perception and let it make you feel sh*t about your own life.

On Sunday I competed in a trail run half marathon. On any day it is tough enough, but this year, in 29 degree heat, it was nearly impossible. The field was strung out, and I overtook many runners and in turn was overtaken myself. The instinct to fight back, latch onto their heels and keep with them kicks in, yet you realise you haven’t got much left in the tank and a with few miles to go the mere promise of finishing isn’t guaranteed, so I find I have to carry on as I’m going and just run my own race. Adjusting my gameplan and tactics from comparing myself to another runner is ludicrous. Those runners are probably fitter, or train harder than me. Hitching on to someone faster and fitter is only going to end one way – in a big fat DNF.

Incidentally, in another trail run I was running a few weeks ago, I ran for a stretch with a guy who had an Ironman tattoo on his leg. I see these tattoos a lot. At every event more or less and to me it means they are fit triathletes who have completed a World Triathlon event, as the tattoo bears the event’s logo. I think to myself that these guys and girls are serious, the ultimate endurance athletes and are forces to be reckoned with. At this said event, for the first time, I directly asked the guy a question about the tattoo, and I posed it to him that this event would be easy, given his World Series Triathlon pedigree, to which he responded, “Oh that? I did a sprint (short distance) triathlon last year, I haven’t done a full distance one. I didn’t finish either, I ran out of juice on the final leg”. I was somewhat amused as I’ve been a fool all these years, measuring myself against people, when not all of them are completely truthful. I did appreciate his honesty however.

Like I said, run your own race. What you measure yourself against could be smoke and mirrors. People will show you only what they want you to see, in all aspects of life. That bumper sticker should say One life – yours. Live it – your way.

Despite feeling exhausted on Sunday morning when I woke up (a couple of hours before my alarm), I knew I needed to get out. I set out running just before six, heading off in the bright sunshine, heading in one direction – out of town.

It may be a modern human condition or something deep within us from generations gone by, but a lot of people feel the need to get outdoors to relax, escape and deal with various stresses. It is widely known that green is a relaxing colour, and I can’t help but feel this is deeply wired in us from when greenery surrounded us more than it does today.

Two miles in, and the houses are getting fewer and fewer. Hedgerows appear, copses, circling swallows and insistent skylarks. By the time I get to the woods, the silence and the low morning sunlight flooding in makes me stop and just sit. I sit down on a fallen tree and just soaked up the surroundings, immersing myself in nature and the feeling of breathing in the new day, replacing the negativity.

During the 1980s, the Japanese developed Shinrin-yoku, also known as forest bathing, which involves taking in the forest with the senses. You can either sit, or walk in a forest and soak everything up, just as I did. It doesn’t involve any high intensity exercise and has been proven to be very successful. A 2-hour forest bathe helps you to unplug from the working day, laptops, phones and other modern day distractions and stress enhancers.

It is predicted that by 2050, 66% of the planet’s population will live in cities. With cities and towns getting bigger and bigger, this is not too surprising. I always imagine cities like giant octopuses, spreading their tarmac tentacles out into the countryside, swallowing it in chunks and expanding their concrete mass as they go.

I know I will always favour the outdoors as therapy. It works for me in many ways to cope with modern life. Plus it’s much more interesting than 99% of what’s on television and spending hours reading silly blogs online. Oh, hang on…